Tricks to Grow Your Social Media Following

So, you’re trying to grow your personal or corporate brand and you know you need to hop on board the social media bus pronto, but you don’t know where to begin. You’re afraid to Tweet “the wrong way,” or you don’t know on which social media platforms you belong. You just know you want to increase that social media following, increase your exposure, influence, and of course, your bottom line!

Remember social means a two-way conversation; it’s not a one-way billboard ad.

Here we go: The tricks to grow your social media following! After all, the larger and more captive your audience is, the better your chances are of selling your product or service. It’s still somewhat of a numbers game.

1. Follow the RIGHT People

Growing your audience starts by following the people relevant to your product, service or industry. So, if you’re an organic food startup, start following foodie peeps to see how they “do food.” It’s always great to see what the competition is doing and how they present their brand and grow their own social media following. If you engage with them on all the platforms (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, Pinterest), they will probably follow you back, which increases your following. And now you’ve got RELEVANT followers.

2. Be Consistent

Whether you decide you want to blog (for the purpose of presenting yourself as the leader in your field), once a day, or once a month, human beings don’t love surprises. We like routine. We like consistency. When we’re consistent, we’re reliable. So in all of your social media platforms, commit to how frequently you will be posting, and stick to it. Imagine showing up at Starbucks when you wanted a coffee at 11 a.m., and they just decided to close. We like knowing what to expect.

3. Share Relevant Information With a Twist

Think smart, but think WITTY. Put on that human (and funny) face. When you start to provide good VALUE to your community, you start to establish yourself as the leader in your field. You do so by sharing your knowledge, your expertise, interesting links and articles, and information relevant to your audience. But I would like to add: don’t leave your sense of humor at the door. Also inject some jokes, funny pictures, and inspirational sayings. Inject some open-ended questions to receive feedback from your audience. No one likes a stiff in social media (no pun intended). Switch it up. Provide the important value, but keep things SPICY to really nail social media. Committing the deadly sins is not the biggest deal in social media, in my opinion. I commit them all the time, but it keeps things real and authentic and SOCIAL. And people enjoy REAL.

4. Remember, It’s Called SOCIAL Media for a Reason. It’s Not a One-Way Advertising Billboard

I see it all the time – brands doing social all wrong. No engagement. No one answers fans’ questions on Twitter or Facebook, brands just direct you constantly to their website, product or service. Have we forgotten this is called SOCIAL media? Remember social means a two-way conversation; it’s not a one-way billboard ad. I’m amazed how many people still get this wrong.

5. Contests, Freebies and Twitter Parties Bring Audiences, but Beware!

If you want to fast track and grow those followers, there’s nothing like a good Facebook contest, giveaway, or Twitter party. But, is this always the way to get the BEST followers? I would rather have fewer ENGAGED followers than more IRRELEVANT followers. If your followers ain’t buying what you’re selling, then those numbers really don’t mean much to you. So while giveaways, or “opt in” to receive X will be effective in growing numbers, I caution you about WHO those followers are. What I personally love is a good Twitter party. Yes I do. Consider hosting your very own Twitter party once a month whereby you choose a different topic each month and create content engagement for 30 minutes or one hour around that topic. This is a wonderful way to establish yourself as the leader in your field and grow those numbers.